"A Beautiful Unspoilt Part of Spain" Pontevedra by ColinReid

Why visit Pontevedra?
We live in southeastern Spain where it is hot and dry, especially in the summer, so the Atlantic coast of Galicia seemed to offer us a few days of cool weather, green countryside and riverside walks.
We were not disappointed.
We flew to Santiago de Compostela by direct RyanAir flight from Alicante and took a taxi, a very fast taxi, to Santiago railway station. There is a bus service from the airport to the station, if you prefer.
Spanish trains are excellent and this line between La Coruña and Vigo is no exception. The journey from Santiago to Pontevedra takes about an hour and costs €21 return for 2 people. You buy the outgoing tickets (Ida) and pay €19 then when coming back you present these first tickets at your return station and you receive the return tickets (Vuelta) for €2. Look carefully at your tickets because on some trains you are automatically allocated a seat number.
See the RENFE website.....................http://www.renfe.com/viajeros/index.html
This is a middle distance (Media Distancia) line, the trains are new, very comfortable, fast and normally on time. At 157km/hr. you hardly felt you were moving.
Arriving at Pontevedra station there were no taxis on the Taxi Rank but an elderly gent in an old white Mercedes took pity on us and ran us to the Parador hotel (see separate review under Hotels). I was wearing my lucky Spanish hat that my wife had made and he thought it was a good omen for Spain to win the World Cup that night which, of course, they did.
Pontevedra is a small, busy yet relaxed city. The old historic centre, where the Parador is, is a delight. You can walk around it in about 20 minutes. There appears to be a bar or restaurant on every corner, on some corners more than one. The food is superb, not expensive and the variety on offer is staggering. If you want something for an early breakfast go to the municipal market alongside the river near the old bridge, upstairs there is a comfortable café. We didn’t see any other Brit tourists, mainly Spanish tourists and a couple of Japanese.
All the people we met were really warm and friendly and the service in the bars and restaurants was professional yet informal and friendly.
We highly recommend Pontevedra for a short stay in unspoilt Spain.

Parador at Pontevedra
We stayed 3 nights in this beautiful old building which has been converted into a hotel. It is conveniently situated in the middle of the historic centre of Pontevedra and we can recommend it.
The rooms are comfortable, well decorated and furnished in traditional style.
The atmosphere of the old building has been preserved including the original wooden floorboards which can be a bit noisy especially if someone in the room above is wearing hard shoes or is moving furniture.
The staff are pleasant and professional although we had a minor misunderstanding because they did not reply properly to our prior request regarding what equipment would be available to us in the room.
We cannot comment on the bar nor restaurant as we ate out and breakfast starts at 8 a.m. but the room service does not start until 9 a.m. so if you want to go out exploring early then it is better to look for breakfast or whatever in the nearby bars, the good café on the first floor of the municipal market opens very early.

• Pros:Pleasant, relaxed, no Tourist pressures
• Cons:Winter weather could be a problem
• In a nutshell:An unspoilt , beautiful part of Spain